Salt + Light Blog

Just over a week from now Pope Benedict will flying from Rome to Scotland to begin his Apostolic Journey to the United Kingdom.

Organizers have been posting weekly audio updates on the official Papal Visit website.  The updates are short, and the page also has a transcription of the audio. It provides some nice background into the trip.  For example, the August 31st edition features an interview with Lord Chris Patten.  He’s the British government representative overseeing the Holy Father’s visit.  In his interview, Lord Patten said that this visit deserves the description “historic,” adding “the first state visit of a Pope to the United Kingdom is a moment of very great significance.”

A Catholic, Lord Patten also noted that the trip is significant not just for Britain:

It’s worth remembering that this is not only a great British event but a great European Commonwealth event, 40% of Canadians are Catholic, 25% of Australians, and a great global event. When the Pope went to Sydney for World Youth Day I think more people went to Sydney for that than went to Sydney for the Olympics. We would expect a huge amount of global attention for his visit here. So I think this visit will be hugely interesting, hugely successful, and the one thing we can’t hand-on-heart guarantee is the weather, but we hope it will be more like Rome than Oslo.

Now I’m not sure what the weather is like in Oslo these days, but I agree that when the Holy Father visits a country what he says is far reaching.  Yes, it is often tailored to the specific country he is in, but his words are for the universal Church.

You can check out the audio updates, here.

And don’t forget to tune into Salt + Light’s coverage of the Holy Father’s Apostolic Journey to the United Kingdom.  For more details, visit here.

Share

Matthew Harrison

Cor ad cor loquitur — heart speaks to heart.

That’s the motto Cardinal John Henry Newman chose for his coat of arms when he was given the red hat.

Some 130 years later, it’s the theme of Pope Benedict XVI’s Apostolic Journey to the United Kingdom – a visit that will be highlighted by the Beatification Mass of Cardinal Newman.

Salt + Light Television will bring you the Beatification, as well as all the other events surrounding the Holy Father’s September 16th-19th trip. Visit our Apostolic Journey page for full broadcast details HERE.

The first day begins in Scotland, and will be highlighted by a meeting with Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II and an open-air Mass in Glasgow. The Pontiff will travel to London for the second day and meet with Catholic educators, religious congregations, and the Archbishop of Canterbury. The day will close with an ecumenical prayer service. Saturday will be highlighted by Mass at Westminster Cathedral and a prayer vigil at Hyde Park in anticipation of Newman’s beatification. The final day of the visit consists of a meeting with Bishops in England, Scotland, and Wales and Cardinal Newman’s Beatification Mass at Cofton Park, in Birmingham, England.

Follow our blog in the lead up and during the trip for insight, addresses, homilies, and background information. You can also keep in touch on our Facebook page, and stream us live online here, or on your iPhone 3Gs/4G.

Share

Matthew Harrison

[The following article from Salt + Light Television CEO Fr Thomas Rosica, CSB, was published in the weekly English edition of L'Osservatore Romano on August 11, 2010.]

On 19 September, 2010, in Birmingham, England, the long awaited Beatification ceremony will take place for the great Victorian Catholic theologian, John Henry Cardinal Newman, one of the most influential English Catholics of the 19th century. He journeyed from Anglicanism to Catholicism and used his great intellect and masterful writing ability to win over thousands of people to Christ and the Roman Catholic Church.

Cardinal Newman will be proclaimed Blessed by Pope Benedict XVI himself, in a break with the tradition of his Pontificate that has the Pope presiding over canonization ceremonies for new saints while a Vatican Cardinal or Archbishop would preside over Beatification ceremonies. Benedict XVI and John Henry Newman have chemistry!

John Henry Newman was born 21 February 1801 into an Anglican family of bankers. He was the firstborn of John Newman and Jemima Fourdrinier. From an early age he had a passion for God and spiritual matters, having experienced his “first conversion”, as he described it, at 15. He was ordained an Anglican minister in 1825, when he finished his studies at the University of Oxford. Three years later, he was appointed vicar of St Mary the Virgin Church, in Oxford.

In 1833, he organized what became known as the Oxford Movement, intending to combat three evils threatening the Church of England –  spiritual stagnation, interference from the State, and unorthodoxy. When studying the history of the early Christian Fathers in 1839, Newman discovered that the position of his own Church was like that of the early heretics. He decided to retire from Oxford life, and he and a few others took up residence at nearby Littlemore. For three years he lived a strict religious life, praying for light and guidance. On 9 October 1845, Newman was received into the Roman Catholic Church by Fr Dominic Barberi, an Italian theologian and a member of the Passionist Congregation. Fr Barberi was beatified by Pope Paul VI in 1963.

Read more…

Share

Father Thomas Rosica

In addition to a September 16th to 19th Papal trip to the United Kingdom which Pope Benedict has asked prayers for, September brings us the following papal intentions:

General Intention: The Word of God as Incentive for Social Development
That the proclamation of the Word of God may renew people’s hearts, encouraging them to work toward authentic social progress.

Mission Intention: End of War
That by opening our hearts to love we may put an end to the wars and conflicts which continue to bloody our world.

-
CNS photo/Alessia Giuliani, Catholic Press Photo

Share

Matthew Harrison

For those of you devoted to Cardinal John Henry Newman, you may want to circle it on your calendar.

October 9th.

That was the day of the Cardinal’s conversion to Catholicism in 1845.

And Pope Benedict XVI is set to announce it as his feast day when he officially declares the English scholar beatified on September 19th of this year.

That’s according to a special edition of Magnificat, published specifically for the liturgies and events of next month’s Papal Visit to the United Kingdom.

One million copies of the booklet will be distributed to parishes across England, Scotland and Wales.

The London-based Catholic Herald has more HERE.

The Beatification Mass of Cardinal Newman will highlight the Holy Father’s September 16th-19th visit to the United Kingdom. Salt + Light Television will bring you full coverage of the Mass, as well as all the other liturgies and events during the Apostolic Journey. Keep an eye on our blog in the coming days for a posting of broadcast details.

Share

Matthew Harrison

It looks like there will be a touch of Tolkien when Pope Benedict XVI visits Birmingham, England next month.

No, we’re confident the Holy Father will not be quoting portions of Lord of the Rings in any homilies or addresses.

However, the legendary author’s great nephew, Tim Tolkien, will be sculpting a life-size statue of Cardinal John Henry Newman for Birmingham’s Cofton Park.

That’s where the Pontiff will celebrate an open-air Beatification Mass for the holy scholar on September 19th.

The steel, bronze-sprayed statue will likely be placed next to the stage, and the accomplished sculptor is hopeful the Holy Father will bless it.

“It’s a great privilege,” said the 47-year old, “The Pope doesn’t come often and it’s happening in this city.”

Read the full article about the sculpture at the Birmingham Mail HERE.

Of course, this isn’t the first Tolkien-Newman connection.  The Cardinal founded the English Oratory (the Oratory of St. Philip Neri is a congregation of priests and brothers founded by St. Philip in Rome in the 16th century).  He later lived, and was buried, at the Birmingham Oratory.

When his mother died, a 12-year old Tolkien was entrusted to a priest at the Birmingham Oratory (his father had died years earlier, and the family had separated themselves from them after Tolkien’s mother converted to Catholicism).  For a period Tolkien lived and attended an Oratorian run school.  In fact, there’s an amusing legend that Tolkien took great pleasure placing the house’s cat in the refectory’s lazy Susan (or dumbwaiter) – offering a bit of a surprise for servers at meals!

-

Check back regularly to the Salt + Light blog for further updates on the trip and our broadcast details.
CNS photo/courtesy Fathers of the Birmingham Oratory

Share

Matthew Harrison

In less than a month Pope Benedict XVI will be landing in Great Britain. Today the Vatican released the official schedule for the trip. It won’t be the first Papal Visit to the UK; Pope John Paul II visited the UK in 1982, but his visit was strictly pastoral.

Pope Benedict’s visit will be pastoral, but since he accepted a formal invitation by the UK government it is also considered a State visit. He will not only make a courtesy visit to Her Magesty Queen Elizabeth at her Scottish summer palace, he will also meet with Prime Minister David Cameron, Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, and the leader of the opposition.

Pope Benedict will also meet with the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, at Lambeth Palace. No doubt observers will be watching that meeting closely. After the meeting with Williams, the Holy Father will proceed to Westminster Hall. There, in the same hall where St. Thomas More was tried and convicted, Pope Benedict will deliver an address to British academic and religious leaders as well as members of the cultural and business world.

The highlight of the papal visit, however, is meant to be the beatification of Cardinal John Henry Newman. On the evening September 18th the Holy Father will lead a prayer vigil in London’s Hyde Park in preparation for the beatification. The next morning he will fly to Birmingham’s Cofton Park to celebrate the beatification Mass for Cardinal Newman.  (as an aside, but related to the Holy Father’s celebration of Mass during this trip: CNS is reporting that the Papal Masses will feature some of the new English translation, specifically parts of the Mass usually set to music, such as the Gloria.)

Access to Papal Events on this trip is tightly controlled to ensure that those who attend papal Masses and prayer services are there out of genuine spiritual desire. People who want to attend an event must register through their parish. They are then assigned a pilgrim group, complete with a group leader and they must travel with that group on the day of the event. On the upside, they will get “pilgrim packs” along with their tickets, a pack of memorabilia, missals, maps, and other materials to make attending an event a spiritual event as much as possible. Of course the Pope will be traveling through the city by car and Pope mobile and people will be able to catch a glimpse of him as he passes.

Salt + Light will be bringing you full live coverage of the visit, airing the events which are televised by the host broadcaster in the UK.  Stay tuned to our website in the coming weeks for a detailed broadcast schedule.  In the meantime, here is the schedule of the trip that the Vatican released today. Times are local with Eastern Standard Time in parenthesis:

Read more…

Share

Alicia Ambrosio

Thirty one thousand decades of the Rosary and one hundred and thirty days of Eucharistic adoration.

That’s the amount of prayer that benefactors of the charity Aid to the Church in Need have pledged to Pope Benedict XVI.

For those of you keeping count, that prayer total works out to more than six months of continuous prayer.

And that doesn’t include the eleven thousand Masses that will be offered for the Holy Father!

ACN organized the “prayer-action” for the Pontiff in anticipation of his visit to the United Kingdom, September 16th-19th.

Those who participated will have their name added to a book that will presented to the Holy Father during his Apostolic journey.

Aid to the Church in Need is an international Catholic charity that helps suffering and persecuted faithful worldwide.  You may have even seen some of their television programs on Salt + Light. Some of their projects include training for seminarians and aid for Iraqi Christian refugees (as a side note:  though not related to ACN, Toronto’s Archbishop Thomas Collins has recently encouraged Canadians to support the latter group).

Visit Vatican Radio HERE to learn more about ACN’s “Prayer-Action” for the Pope and the Papal visit to the UK.

-

CNS photo/Paul Haring

Share

Matthew Harrison

Castel Gandolfo was busy yesterday as Pope Benedict XVI marked the solemnity of the Assumption.

First there was the celebration of Mass at the Church of St. Thomas, located just across from the summer Papal residence.  Later in the day, the Holy Father welcomed the faithful to Castel Gandolfo for his Angelus address.

Of course, his address and homily focused on our Blessed Mother, and the significance of her assumption “body and soul into heavenly glory”. (Munificentissimus Deus 44)

In his homily the Pontiff stressed Mary’s great faith.  The Pope said faith is the root of the victory over death that we see anticipated in the Assumption.  Her faith is “obedience to the Word of God and a total abandon to divine initiative and action as announced to her by the Archangel.”

The Pope also offered a meditation on Heaven during his homily.  He says when the Church teaches that Mary was taken “body and soul into heaven,” heaven is not a reference “to some place in the universe, a star or something similar.”  He explained:

With the word “Heaven’, we affirm that God, the God who made himself close to us, will never abandon us, not even in death or beyond it, but has a place for us and grants us eternity. We are saying that in God, there is a place for us.

Read more…

Share

Matthew Harrison

Earlier this year, Pope Benedict XVI encouraged priests to become familiar with new media as a possible tool for evangelization. In light of this, the United States Conference of Bishops have released guidelines for church-personnel on how to use social media-such as blogs and Facebook pages- as part of ministry.

The document said that social communications can offer three principle opportunities and challenges to the the Church and to the world at large:

• Visibility
• Community and
• Accountability

Furthermore, the USCCB said social media can offer increased visibility, a tool to strengthen the community and accountability. Among other things, Church groups are instructed to define boundaries of appropriate communication for their site, include a code of conduct on the site, and provide instruction to users on how to report inappropriate material and block offensive users. When providing links to other website church groups are instructed to provide links to trusted website and be familiar with what is on those sites.

For the full list of guidelines visit www.usccb.org/comm and click on diocesan resources.

Share

Alicia Ambrosio